George Stevens Jr. will not be present when a new 60th anniversary restoration of his father’s western classic “Shane” shows Saturday at the TCM Classic Film Festival (along with a new restoration of Stevens Sr.’s “Giant”). But his absence, he says, has “absolutely nothing” to do with the controversy over the film’s aspect ratio. It’s because he’s introducing a new film that he and his son made at the Tribeca Film Festival on Friday night.

Stevens supervised not only both restorations, but oversaw a high-definition digital transfer of “Shane” in 1:66, the same aspect ratio that the film was shown in during its original theatrical engagements in 1953. The TCM festival, which scheduled the 1:66 version, announced last week that the film would instead be shown in 1:37 — the aspect ratio that Stevens Sr. and his cinematographer, Loyal Griggs composed it in — after Paramont made both versions available. At the same, Warner Home Video, which announced “Shane” would make its Blu-ray debut on June 4 in the 1:66 ratio, indicated last week that the film would instead go out at 1:37 at a date yet to be confirmed.

The director’s son, a noted documentary filmmaker and founder of the American Film Institute, says he doesn’t want to talk about the “political correctness brigade” — led by blogger Jeffrey Wells — that successfully lobbied for the switch.

But he’s happy to talk about how odd history of how the two aspect ratios came about.

“Shane” was shot in the 1:37 “Academy” ratio in 1951 — “the same way my father shot ‘A Place in the Sun,’ ” the son says. But by the time it was ready for release in early 1953, Fox had announced CinemaScope and the other studios were gearing up for widescreen releases to compete with television. “Shane” was the first widescreen release of this era — there had been some experiments with early talkies — opening on April 23, 1953 at Radio City Music Hall.

“They built a new wide screen at the Music Hall, and they masked off the projector so that some of the top of the picture was cut off at the top and some at the bottom,” says George Stevens Jr. “It wasn’t ideal, but my father went along with it for the initial release because of the competition from CinemaScope and the climate of people wanting the big screen.”

The full screen 1:37 version of “Shane” has been shown for many years on television, as well as for all video releases to date.

For the Blu-ray, Stevens Jr. says, Paramount originally approached him with the idea that the release should include both versions. For the 1:66, he reviewed the framing shot by shot — “you can frame it so the Tetons remain. It’s quite a beautiful version as a result. Though my preference remains for the (1:37) version my father framed.

“Paramount at one point said to me that ‘Shane’ was shot so it could be shown in diferent aspect ratios. Not true, it was shot the way it was shot. And it was always my intention to have the true version of ‘Shane’ released on video. This was never a capitulation on my part.”

Paramount eventually licensed the film to WHV, which he says told him that putting both versions on one disc wasn’t a feasible idea.

Stevens hopes the 1:66 version will at least used to replace the widescreen version of “Shane” he says is currently being shown on AMC.

“Instead of cropping the top and the bottom, they’ve stcretched the picture the picture so it looks like Jack Palace’s horse is 12 feet long,” he says. “I know my father would prefer my 1:66 version to that.”

WHV will also be releasing the restoration of “Giant” that Stevens supervised later this year — in 1:66.

“When we made ‘Giant,’ my father chose the 1:66 aspect ratio because he liked tight framing,” says Stevens, who was a producer on the film. “George Stevens shot many scenes in deep shadow and if the operator doing the transfer doesn’t know that, they tend to want to remove the shadows. I’m the only person left who was in the editing room who knows what the film is supposed to look like. I have a responsibility to make sure the look is maintained.”

It was while working with his father on the script for “Giant,” Stevens said, that he met cartoonist Herbert Block — who, 60 years later, became the subject of “Herblock: The Black and the White,” which will have its world premiere Friday at the Tribeca Festival. Stevens produced the film, which was directed by his son Michael.

“Dad turned me onto Herblock during the Army-McCarthy hearings and we became friends,” he says of the Pultizer prize winning cartoonist, who died in 2001. “He lived in Georgetown not far from us. He had a sunny personality but a wicked ability to go after people like Nixon when they were on the wrong side.”

“I was really looking forward to be at the TCM screenings,” says Stevens, who will join his son for the Tribeca premiere. “But I’m totally locked out” by the conflict with Tribeca.